Galactic Civilizations III

After years of playing this gem i have found that every update has made the experience less and less enjoyable between nerf after nerf after nerf. First the synthetic race option got blown into oblivion by being forced to have population limits close to a third of the planets class. I can handle one nerf but then they ruined spy's, prior to a nerf the spy's were able to disable tiles much like they can now however if you disabled a planets capital it would be overpopulated instantly and begin losing population while reaching incredible level of negative approval. This systom was so fun! Why the devs removed this in favor of inherent population i have no idea, but it totaly made spys useless for anything more than seeing what your neighbor is up too and they cost a citizen so it isn't worth your time to build. My next criticism is the blatant cheating of ai. While i am in a black void searching for planets and resources my counterpart b lines for all the best locations forcing me to go to war or die, while it was exciting the first couple times going to war EVERY SINGLE TIME I WANT TO PLAY is exhausting and it chokes every bit of creativity out of winning in the game. I used to be able to make super planets capable of stunning shipbuilding speeds and nearly researching entire techs in the late game with one turn but now it just mindless murder. (This Part is an edit, 6.12.26) I continue to believe that the devs sucked out every bit of creativity in victory, that being said i believe this game is vastly better than its sequel. beauty in its simplicity galactic civ 3 has a better race builder in my opinion due to the clear benefits and not so beneficial choices you can make to optimize your civ. I suppose after everything this game is still my favorite turn based strategy in space but there isnt any good competion. with alot of love please put one more dlc in with CREATIVE wins so i can do something onconventional to earn my wins.

I don't recommend this game at the moment mainly because it pisses me off. But since I've written a review, here it is: Though I want to like this game and sometimes recommend it there are a few things that I think could be better. So though this is a vaguely moderate review, don’t let my below negative points dissuade you from trying it if you like these type of turn based resource management games as it is still very engaging. I don’t have all the DLCs and I mostly don’t play any of the campaigns (yet) but I do like the worlds in crisis and the mod that adds governments for your race. Major Issues: There is a complete lack of the vastness of space. The game looks and feels like it is played on a two dimensional board. This includes your ships going faster than light. It doesn’t remotely feel like it. For a computer game you are forced to do a supreme amount of micromanaging to run your civilization There is no such thing as a staff or cabinet to help you in your decisions. As you expand your research, there are more structures available for you to build on your planets. The trick is, the explanation of some of these structures is confusing. In fact, I’ve never figured out if I should build one or two or three (or even more!) basic type of buildings before building the one-of-a-kind buildings that improve those original types. You actually have to do a complicated math yourself to figure it out with some benefits listed as percentages and others a +1 or +2 or higher. Zero Tactics in Space Battles. You have no tactical control over them other than whether to engage but only if you initiate the attack. Every battle is a fight to the death. Ships are not rendered disabled and/or drifting in space as derelicts but blow completely to pieces (only the Snathi seem to be able to salvage ships). There is no option to retreat before an engagement or during when your losses get too high. The speed of your ships is of no advantage in the fight. Though it appears there are sublight engines for maneuvering, they are always used to go full speed directly at your enemy often to their death. In addition, all your ships head straight into battle, so if you have a few faster ships, they will move in quickly, and possibly just as quickly, get destroyed piecemeal as they come into range of your enemies weapons. So, I do not recommended putting different types of ships in the same fleet as your enemy can potentially engage and destroy each type one at a time. There are no formations available, no prioritized targeting. All weapons can fire on what ever ship they are targeting, even if it is through their own hull. Arc of fire does not exist. The battles, though they look pretty, are simply a matter of math. So, you want the most powerful weapons in the greatest numbers and the best defenses specific to your enemies weapons. The only tactics you can apply are in your research tree, i.e. researching weapons, defenses, fleet size, etc. before your enemies. This is one of the greatest disappointments of the game. In fact, I always hit quick battle when I get into a fight because it’s not like you have any control of the situation. The final issue is during your enemies turn to attack you, the screen goes from battle to battle with no opportunities for you to make any adjustments, such as rebuilding a destroyed ship yard, or moving your ships in response. The turn based system leaves you little options in the defense. Turn based. Though this is doable for large strategic type planning and movements, it does not work for combat. The combat in this game is disappointing and sometimes I wish I could just skip it. But you can’t. You still have to watch the animation of ships getting destroyed. And if you watch the long battle, when that is done, you STILL have to watch the quick battle. It also completely lacks the vastness of space. Every battle looks like a dogfight. Minor: You receive no notification that a ship being repaired in a space dock, space station, or in orbit, has completed repairs, and this failure makes it very easy to lose track of ships. Starbases repair the fastest (6 points per turn), then it’s ships in orbit (5), then shipyards (4), which makes no sense as shipyards should have the highest repair factor. This means it can take WAY longer to repair a larger ship than it does to build a new one. So, if I’m at war, I stop repairing my big ships and have them fight until they are destroyed. Sending them to a starbase to repair can be useless as you too easily lose track of them and they are out of the game until you manually go through all your starbase, planets, and shipyards to find your forgotten ships. Though you can rename fleets as you wish (which is necessary to find specific fleets in the list), these changes are often lost after reloading a save, which means finding a specific fleet on a large map can be problematic. I’ve also found that some of my named fleets aren’t even listed under the ships icon. Not sure why that isn’t working. You can set your ships or fleets to Guard and they will stay there and only become alerted for orders if an alien ship comes within their sensor range. This doesn’t work if you are laying siege to a planet waiting for transports to arrive so you can invade. Enemy ships that are produced and placed in orbit around that planet do not alert your ships that are near to it. Only ships not in orbit. Not helpful. You also receive no warning that a new shipyard has been built, which should not be possible if you are keeping ships next to an enemy planet. Enemy ships in close proximity should keep you from being able to build a shipyard! There is no hiding your ships. Hiding in orbit around a planet is not possible. In fact, orbiting a planet that is not settled is not allowed. Ships in gas clouds and nebulas, though they might move slower and have restrictions to their sensor range, while in the clouds, those ships outside these areas can see you perfectly fine. These clouds and nebula should make any ships within then more difficult to find. That would have been cool. Instead, your research into sensors only increases their range, and any ship within that range is discovered, no matter how small. When an enemy engages you in battle, you will have the choice to watch a short or long version of it, though if you pick the long version, you will still have to watch the short version after. But the worst thing about this is that immediately after that battle is resolved, it will switch to the next battle, without you having the chance to adjust your forces, or rebuild a shipyard that was destroyed. That is extremely frustrating after awhile and is the reason I uninstalled it today. A surrendering civilization makes no sense as any civilization that surrenders will give their remaining planets to another player entirely. This is one of the stupidest things in the entire game.

And so I realized I needed some time out from the tension and complexity introduced by DWU and DW2. Moving along my games library, I found the GC series, one that I collected, but never had the chance to play. "Seems straightforward enough to me... MoO style, right?" And, boy!, was I wrong! This thing has LAYERS of complexity to it; went through, as far as my limited experience with it can see, TONS of tweaks between iterations and patches and dlcs; it has clever writting, great lore and tremendous flow between mechanics. But IT TAKES TIME TO LEARN. GOD, IT TAKES TIME TO LEARN! I've been scum-saving on this one, just so I can figure out how to reach that level 19 planet before the Altarians without spending my 'derrière' on ships, or how to stretch that pop growth a bit further and a bit earlier. Ok, then. And how does it work, after all? I'm gonna need more time with it, of course, but I guess I can brush around the more superficial aspects of gameplay. As expected, you colonize worlds and employ a large array of ships to discover new zones to explore. Oh, and get this - NO STAR LANES! Pretty important to me, at least, since it allows for different strategies and forces the player to consider how to defend planets. AS you'll explore, you'll find that planets have different quality levels, which in turn gives you more - or less - hexes within the planet map to build increments. Each planet might as well have special hexes to it - some with special attributes, such as rich fields or natural wonders - which grant bonuses to adjacent tiles (hexes) or to your overall resource accumulation. Some of these will increase your influence, while others will give you tourism; some will increase construction levels, and others yet might offer more food. Now, you'll also have plenty of options as to how to achieve victory. The game offers a variety of tools to diversify the battlegrounds while making sure these victory lanes are all covered. Influence, for example, might allow an empire to flip another's worlds to their own side. Therefore, combat isn't the only way to win, although, as far as I can see, the game demands a certain balance, if the player wants to survive. GCIII offers a wealth of content in the form of factions (with the addition of Star Control factions through dlc) while also allowing the player to create their own faction from scratch (much like Master of Orion and the myriad clones and remakes of modern days). During gameplay, leaders and promoted citizens add bonuses and offer even more immersion to an already elegant game. Further aspects, such as ship design, government types and ideologies allow the player to adapt to the circumstances of each map, while investing the faction with the player's personal style. For an avid space 4x player, this game is like a plentiful, colorful meal. And it doesn't hurt that the rest of the series is also refined and interesting (from the spreadsheet crazyness and elaborate descriptions in 1 to the more accessible and cinematic experiences in 4). And even though the series has undergone major changes throughout the years, there's one quality that remains, a quality that captivated me from the very first GC: it is always teaching the player new tricks, always inviting the player to experiment even further. Which in my case means... Well... Scumsaving, forum diving and doc searching all over the place. Oh, well... I always loved games I had to play with a notebook by my side... Hats of to the devs. This one's a keeper.

This game is an absolute blast! If you like civilization style games, this is an absolute must have! Positives: 1. Large variety of map sizes 2. Good number and variety of unit types/capabilities/powers 3. Diverse world set 4. Beautiful looking maps, starts, and cool looking units/structures 5. Easy to learn 6. Variety of ways to win/play 7. Fun and unique factions 8. Interesting lore of factions 9. Highly moddable 10. Hundreds of player made civilizations 11. Ability to make custom units/factions 12. Large variety of diplomatic deals that can be offered. 13. Trade deals are fair, unlike the garbage deals offered by Sid Meyers Civilization games. 14. You are NOT constantly pestered by AI players for diplomatic deals. (Such a big relief after dealing with Sid Meyers Civilization games) Negatives: 1. Limits in how frequent one can make trade/diplomatic deals with other factions 2. Either missing or hard to locate turn countdown between trade/diplomatic deals This game is so much fun to play. In my opinion, it is the epitome of turn based Grand Strategy/Civilization Building games. Request for the game maker, please make a planet focused version of this game. If you take this game, and re-skin it to appear like a planet based Sid Meyers game, you will put that guy out of business, and I will buy the game plus all the expansion packs as soon as my wallet allows.

This reminds me of Masters of Orion 2. With expansions ya have 1000s of hours of total sith-like galactic rule! Better than GalCiv4 !!! NO BS! #4 they changed way too much just get the expansions and bonus free community created stuff. A++++

I love this game, and I wish I could recommend it. But I can't. There are some serious issues with program stability. Whether its because you have too big of a map, you have too many computer opponents, you own too many ships, because you accumulated too many bonuses during a long campaign, or because that tiny map you designed has a lot of features, you are about as likely to crash the game as win it. Even going the safe rout and proceduraly generating a tiny map against only one opponent will not guarantee you don't crash the game. You might have more luck if your computer has over 20Gb of memory, but its not even always the memory limit that crashes it. Sometimes the game randomly crashes while saving or loading a savefile. Sometimes the ai gets stuck during their turn and never ends it. The game itself is great, 8/10, but this is way too expensive of a game to sometimes not work.

The best version of this game. Recent update has made it better too. This is a must play for 4x Space Strategy Sim players!!

Great game. I like my games on the biggest map and slowest speed for tech research. Gal Civ 3 has huge maps and nice pacing. The only downside is the map maker is hot garbage.

This game is far from perfect and needs a lot of work. I have played a lot of 4X space strategy games, including many of the others made by this developer, Stardock Entertainment, and this one is probably one of my least favorite of them all. 1) LARGE SCALE MAPS = CARPEL TUNNEL SYNDROME The problem with this game is at large scale it becomes a carpel tunnel syndrome problem just to advance to the next turn. On the largest maps, you will typically have over 100 planets, star bases, and fleets to manage, each requiring you to click on something to upgrade something or move something before you can advance to the next turn. This becomes a real problem at large scale where you are forced to click hundreds of times back and forth between the "Idle Ship" or "Idle Planet" button on the far right corner of the interface, and the "Pass" button on the middle left side of the interface, in order to advance one turn. There is so much needless clicking required in this game, it become tedious very quickly. 2) RIDICULOUS OVER-SIZED TECH TREE Add to that the ridiculously over-sized Tech Tree which is impossible to research everything within a normal length game. I often finish most games long before I have even researched a quarter of the total tech tree! That's just silly. 3) NON INTEGER/FRACTIONAL BASED RESOURCES Then there is the small non-integer based resources... that's another pet peeve of mine in this game. Then you have the very minuscule amounts of resources that you can actually mine from your starbases. And of course everything is in fractions! You can't mine 1 unit of whatever, it has to be 0.03 or some decimal of a resource, which means that you can have over a hundred space stations mining the same resource and only be generating a very small total number of said resource per turn. That's just absurd! 4) PLANET COLONIZATION ANNOYING POPUP WITH FRACTIONAL COLONISTS! LOL Need to colonize a planet? Well that means you make a colony ship. But before you can launch said colony ship, a stupid popup appears where you have to choose how many colonists will board the colony ship. But that number is typically between 1 and 3.X colonists! I mean how can you have between 1-3.X colonists and expect to colonize a new planet? How can you have a fractional colonist? lol So that's just stupid! 5) UNDERWHELMING AND TOTALLY NEUTERED PLANETARY BOMBARDMENT/OVERPOWERED PASSIVE-AGGRESSIVE INFLUENCE CONQUERING Then there is the very underwhelming space combat and how it has been totally neutered in this game to favor the incredibly overpowered positive influence/passive aggressive means of conquering planets. Stardock gets planet conquering right in Sins of a Solar Empire Rebellion! They have massive ships which can all bombard and destroy a planet and then colonize it. In that game, planet conquering is awesome and done right! However, in this game, planet conquering has been totally neutered. Can you take your big battleships and bombard a planet and colonize it like in Sins? NO! You have to do stupid crap like make a legion and then make a transport ship, and then have said transport ship go to said planet and only then can you siege a planet. That is so lame! Meanwhile, the goodie too-shoes player who has chosen the overpowered influence model will easily conquer 5-6 planets per turn by doing nothing, except spewing out propaganda from starbases and planets. lol So stupid. I could go on on how this game needs a lot of work. 6) UNDERWHELMING SPACE FLEET COMBAT Like for example the underwhelming ship combat. In sins of a solar empire and in games like Endless Space 2, you get really satisfying space battles between fleets. In this game, its just a whimper/fart of a battle and its over. So disappointing! Sins of a Solar Empire again gets this right, so I know Stardock knows how to do space battles. CONCLUSION So why did they screw it all up in this game? If they could fix the micromanagement/over clicking per turn/interface issue, and fix the overly large research tree, the non integer based resources, and make the actual planetary bombardment and space combat worth playing, then they would have a great game here. But without those things, it's mediocre at best. Go play sins of a solar empire instead.